Along an assembly line, diapers and various types of other disposable absorbent articles may be assembled by adding components to and/or otherwise modifying advancing, continuous webs of material. Webs of material and component parts used to manufacture diapers may include: backsheets, topsheets, absorbent cores, front and/or back ears, fastener components, and various types of elastic webs and components such as leg elastics, barrier leg cuff elastics, and waist elastics.
Some consumers may prefer purchasing absorbent articles, such as diapers, having various types of different graphic designs printed thereon. As such, continuous substrates of material having printed graphics may be converted into different components used to assemble the absorbent articles. During the assembly process, the substrates of material having the graphics printed thereon may be subjected to various process transformations, such as folding, bonding, trimming, and/or cutting.
In some instances, consumers may prefer diapers with graphics defining various designs and various colored areas that may be printed thereon and that may extend over the entire area, or a relatively large area, of the diaper that is visible when worn. Thus, in converting operations involving the assembly of diapers having printed graphics that extend over relatively large regions, the printed substrates may be subjected to various process transformations in areas where the printing is located. However, subjecting printed substrates to various process transformations, such as folding, cutting, bonding, and/or assemblage with other printed components in areas where the graphics are located may create challenges in performing such process transformations when attempting to maintain aesthetically pleasing final assemblies. For example, imprecise and/or inconsistent bonding, cutting, and/or folding operations performed on a substrate in an area where a printed graphic is located may act to visibly highlight such process imprecisions or inconsistencies, such as crooked bond lines, fold lines, and/or cut lines. Some diapers are configured with designs intended to extend contiguously across multiple components that are assembled during the manufacturing process. However, imprecise placement of one printed component onto another printed component may be visibly highlighted when graphics on the separate components appear disjointed and/or misaligned when the components are combined. For example, FIG. 2B1 shows an absorbent article 100 including examples of graphics G on assembled components, such as belts 106, 108 and chassis 102, that require relatively precise alignment along the intersection of the belts 106, 108 and the chassis 102 to provide the appearance of a contiguous design in the final assembly. And FIG. 2B2, particularly in areas enclosed by circles A-A and B-B, illustrates how imprecise and/or inconsistent placement of the chassis 102 relative to the belts 106, 108 during assembly results in the graphics G being disjointed. In addition, the aforementioned challenges may be exacerbated in absorbent article assembly processes operating at relatively high speed production rates.
Consequently, there remains a need to incorporate substrates and/or components into absorbent article assembly processes wherein the substrates and/or components include graphics printed and/or positioned in such a manner so as to functionally reduce noticeable visible results of imprecise and/or inconsistent manufacturing operations performed in areas where the graphics are located.